Pepys lived for another 45 years ... are we sure he never had more bookcases made? He collected books his entire life. Jay's excellent suggestion might tell you how big his closett was when he died.
"framing my great letter to Mr. Hayes about the victualling of the fleete, about which there has been so much ado and exceptions taken by the Generalls."
I imagined a letter in a glass frame hanging on the wall, and thought that curious ... and then I realized Pepys meant that they were drafting and revising their response.
How curious that Pepys never mentioned receiving this letter ... he was so exciting about his new closet nothing else mattered. That gives us a clue about how many interesting details are missing. I've been waiting to hear the gist of the letter he was warned about, and guess this was it.
I think Peach is right about Pepys being Simpson's opportunity to earn cash ... Evelyn tells us that the plague was gripping Deptford, and that was one of the two dockyards where Simpson worked. I bet the Deptford yards were closed. But Greenwich? I haven't heard about what was happening there. Locally there probably wasn't much shipbuilding happening right now.
HOWEVER -- Englishmen did not want the Dutch to invade. These craftsmen were part of a dedicated, trained, employed, industrial war machine. I bet most of them worked, paid or not. If the money went anywhere beyond Castlemaine, it went to the shipbuilders. Simpson could have packed up his tools and taken his family to plague-free Chatham, Sheerness, Harwich or Portsmouth and be welcomed by the brotherhood.
And I agree with John -- Pepys doesn't strike me as "officious". Professional, organized, demanding, yes. But not "assertive of authority in an annoyingly domineering way, especially with regard to petty or trivial matters".
Recently I criticized Pepys for spending his holiday writing a report on his victualing activities. And the next day he persisted with Coventry until he told him that he was doing a good job, and the victualing this year was better than Povy's efforts. Pepys was prepared for the attack from the Generals-at-Sea. Having his ducks in a row and his accounts current isn't being "officious." That's the job. His continued employment -- and potentially his head -- depended on it.
I would have thought a Master-Joiner would have more pressing things to do than build bookcases at this moment. The timing for Pepys' improvements seems ill-considered on so many levels.
"Is SP here a little paranoid and concerned about being overheard,"
Maybe ... or perhaps it was a lovely summer afternoon and they took advantage of it while they could. After all, the fleet is getting ready to go out again soon and the boatmen will disappear so they don't get pressed.
Since Roman times lead often made its way into alcohol, either from its makers using lead acetate to sweeten wine, or storing it in containers glazed with lead.
Physicians were familiar with lead poisoning. Many sent the afflicted to Bath for the springs, where mineral water burbles out of the ground at 120°F. Visitors flocked to the area to bathe in elaborate pools of healing waters, seeking cures for everything from leprosy to infertility.
While hot springs are relaxing, for the most part that’s all they are. But taking a long dip did improve one ailment: the paralysis that occurs from chronic lead intoxication.
Even in the Middle Ages, physicians knew that sitting in the waters of Bath could occasionally cure some types of paralysis. The water’s reputation for curing the malady was advertised by the town in a display of discarded crutches.
One victim, a reverend from Lincolnshire, came to Bath in 1666 unable to lift his arms. After bathing in Bath’s waters every day for almost two months, his doctor noted that the reverend was able to doff his hat in greeting once more.
The explanation is simple. After consuming lead, the human body mistakes it for calcium and uses it to build bone. Over time, the accumulated poison causes violent symptoms. Weightlessness, as it happens, increases calcium loss from bones. Floating for hours gradually strips both calcium and lead from the skeleton, which is then urinated away.
Those “taking the waters” followed a system. Patients trooped into the pools in the morning, as early as 5 a.m. (The water was cleanest in the morning.) The King’s and Queen’s Baths were often filled with invalids, and the nearby Pump Room doled out glasses of warm, mineral-rich water. Other baths included the glamorous Cross Bath and the straightforwardly named Hot Bath and Leper’s Bath. Bathers submerged up to their necks, layered in thick clothing for modesty (for many years, the baths were mixed-gender).
To amuse bored bathers, musicians played instruments and sang.
By the early-18th century, it was de rigueur for the elite to go to Bath, not only to seek healing for high-end illnesses such as gout, but also to enjoy the pleasures of “dances, balls, gambling sessions, concerts, and theatrical performances in the evening,” writes academic Ian C. Bradley.
At the same time, doctors at the Bath General Hospital were conducting the “trial of the waters.” In what was one of the first long-term medical therapy trials in history, doctors at the hospital treated poor paralysis victims with a regimen of fresh food and daily soaks. And it worked -- sometimes.
"He told me how my Lord has drawn a bill of exchange from Spayne of 1200l., and would have me supply him with 500l. of it, but I avoyded it, being not willing to embarke myself in money there, where I see things going to ruine."
Well done Pepys. Did you tell Mr. Moore a whopper to get out of it? "I just spent all my available cash on fire ships" etc.?
Samuel Pepys records seeing Pulcinella in London in 1666. Now known as Mr. Punch, he is an English version of Pulcinella, a character from the Italian Commedia dell’Arte, masked and elaborately costumed players who improvised a drama of stock characters in Naples and beyond in the 16th century. These performing troupes traveled throughout Italy and Europe and performed before Queen Elizabeth in 1572.
Pulcinella was never a major character in the Commedia dell’Arte – but somehow he appealed to puppeteers and the street crowds that they entertained.
In France he became Guignol; in Germany he was Kasper; in Spain he was Cocoliche – and in England, Mr. Punch.
Mr. Punch is still going strong with many of the same jokes and sight gags that entertained crowds in the streets of London 350 years ago.
He carries a club with which he beats anyone who offends him. He argues with his wife, Judy (in Pepys’ day she was called “Joan”). He throws the baby out the window when she cries. He gets in trouble with the law and tricks the devil into hanging himself.
Children love him because he’s irrepressible – “Look behind you, Look behind you,” they squeal when the crocodile rears up to devour him.
His squeaky voice comes from a whistle-like device called a “pivetta” or “swazzle” that the puppeteer holds in the roof of his mouth – another of the ancient practices still used in modern puppetry. An experienced artist can vary between a puppet squeak and a normal human voice in the course of a fast-paced dialogue (always at the risk of swallowing the swazzle).
There’s evidence that swazzles were used for puppets in Shakespeare’s day – although puppets weren’t called puppets back then. They were called “motions”.
So Mr. Punch tells us much about the history of puppetry; a sociopathic clown with the crabby wife (who would blame her for being crabby, being married to him?). He shows us how puppet theater steals and adapts; how it thrives in different cultures; how it sustains a theatrical tradition long after its main-stage source has died.
And Mr. Punch warns playwrights not to become too avant-garde, too esoteric, because puppet theater has always been, and remains, firmly rooted in the public squares and the streets – an art for ordinary people, and kids.
"This attack probably provoked that by the Dutch on Chatham."
This note probably comes from a time when access to the Dutch records was not freely available. We now know that the Dutch expected the French fleet to transport soldiers for a landing earlier this year. If they had been successful with a landing, they intended to go after Chatham.
Generals-at-Sea Monck and Rupert kept the Dutch in the Channel in 1666, but a good idea is not something you forget.
The riverside district north of Millwall was known as Limehouse Hole by the 17th century, and seems originally to have designated a part of the river itself. The name reflects the area's historically greater links with Limehouse than with Poplar or the Isle of Dogs.
The Breach, Poplar Gut and the Gut House.
A large section of the medieval river wall below Limehouse was breached on 20 March, 1660 and much of the Isle of Dogs flooded.
It was the worst breach since that of 1449, although smaller ones had occurred from time to time.
The Poplar Commissioners of Sewers repaired the damage and rebuilt other sections of defective wall, at a cost of more than £16,000, raised by the imposition on landowners of high rates (about £24 per acre). The work was done by William Ham, Orton Brooker and George Salmon, and presumably consisted of timber piling and planking, with chalk and clay fill and buttressing. The new wall was back from the river behind unprotected foreland which was called simply "the Breach".
Most of the floodwater was drained, but approx.. 5 acres remained, stretching eastwards and came to be called the Great Gut, or Poplar Gut.
Pepys will become very familiar with this area in a few year's time.
The eight acres of riverside land immediately south of the boundary between Limehouse and Poplar, empty save perhaps for a few small houses behind the river wall, were leased by Sir Edward and Sir John Yate to John Graves in 1633. Graves was a shipbuilder at the yard on the north side of the boundary (later known as Limekiln Dockyard and then as Dundee Wharf).
The northern part of this property was sublet to George Margetts and, c1650, developed as a ropemaking yard with a wharf, rope house, storehouse, houses and a ropewalk.
In 1664 Samuel Pepys visited Margetts's ropeyard and decided to use it to supply the Navy.
The royal dockyards at Woolwich, Chatham and Portsmouth had their own roperies, but that at Deptford did not, and the Margettses were its principal suppliers of cordage in the late 17th century.
In 1662 Margetts acquired the freehold of Graves' 8 acres, with an additional 2½ acres to the east.
The estate subsequently passed by marriage to Cornelius Purnell, a Portsmouth shipwright. His son sold part of it in 1717 to Philip Willshire, who acquired the remainder in 1723.
The site south of the rope-yard buildings and north of the passage to Limehouse Hole Stairs (Thames Place) was a boat-builder's shed and yard, later used for mast-making.
Limehouse Hole was a plying place for watermen from the 17th century. There were two sets of river stairs in 1687, but only those at the end of the passage that became Thames Place survived.
Near the stairs there was a public house, perhaps known as the White Lion in the late 17th century, later the Chequers, and then the Horns and Chequers.
The Royal Oak public house stood to the east of the distillery on the road that became Emmett Street.
The riverside district north of Millwall was known as Limehouse Hole by the 17th century, and seems originally to have designated a part of the river itself. The name reflects the area's historically greater links with Limehouse than with Poplar or the Isle of Dogs.
The Breach, Poplar Gut and the Gut House. A large section of the medieval river wall below Limehouse was breached on 20 March, 1660 and much of the Isle of Dogs flooded. It was the worst breach since that of 1449, although smaller ones had occurred from time to time.
The Poplar Commissioners of Sewers repaired the damage and rebuilt other sections of defective wall, at a cost of more than £16,000, raised by the imposition on landowners of high rates (about £24 per acre). The work was done by William Ham, Orton Brooker and George Salmon, and presumably consisted of timber piling and planking, with chalk and clay fill and buttressing.
The new wall was back from the river behind unprotected foreland which was called simply "the Breach".
Most of the floodwater was drained, but approx 5 acres remained, stretching eastwards and came to be called the Great Gut, or Poplar Gut.
Limehouse Hole went south from the parish boundary to the South West India Dock (Impounding) entrance lock and inland to include Garford Street. This was one of the first parts of the parish of Poplar to be developed.
Limehouse spread east in the 17th century, Limehouse Hole was built up with shipping-related enterprises. There were shipbuilders, barge-builders, boat-builders, rope-makers, sail-makers, mast-makers, block-makers and ship-chandlers, as well as general wharfingers.
Away from the river there were other industrial premises, and some houses.
The Margetts's Ropeyard The 8 acres of riverside land immediately south of the boundary between Limehouse and Poplar, empty save perhaps for a few small houses behind the river wall, were leased by Sir Edward and Sir John Yate to John Graves in 1633. Graves was a shipbuilder at the yard on the north side of the boundary, later known as Limekiln Dockyard and then as Dundee Wharf.
The northern part of this property was sublet to George Margetts and, c1650, developed as a rope-making yard with a wharf, rope house, storehouse, houses and a rope walk.
In 1664 Samuel Pepys visited Margetts's ropeyard and decided to use it to supply the Navy. The royal dockyards at Woolwich, Chatham and Portsmouth had their own roperies, but Deptford did not, and the Margettses were its principal suppliers of cordage in the late 17th century.
In 1662 Margetts acquired the freehold of Graves' 8 acres, with an additional 2½ acres to the east.
Building gradually increased. In 1664 the Poplar Commissioners of Sewers built a storehouse south of Margetts's rope house, which housed the tools used by the 'marsh-men' to maintain the river wall and foreshore.
William Wood, Snr., MP, was buried at Wapping on 11 Nov. 1678.
Nothing further is known of the Wood family, although his son, William Jr., continued to receive substantial payments from the naval treasurer during 1679.
Perhaps William Jr. didn't know as much about shipbuilding as his father after all -- or perhaps he died.
His election was disputed, but he was allowed to sit on 25 Jan., and was a moderately active MP in the Cavalier Parliament.
He was appointed to 28 committees, most on economic subjects like the preservation of naval stores, and those instructed in 1673 to look into the decay of the Muscovy, Eastland and Greenland trades, and to give local authorities powers to prevent fires.
On 19 Apr. 1675, during a debate on recalling British subjects from the service of the French, he suggested that Joseph, in time of plenty, provided for famine, and although they were in peace, [they] should think of building ships.
On 19 May 1675 Wood was appointed to the committee on the bill appropriating the customs for the use of the navy. His only speech, during a debate in committee on building war ships, gave technical info. on the size and cost of various rates.
As a Middlesex j.p. he was active against conventicles, and the danger from fire in the metropolitan areas.
In the 1677, he was appointed to the committee on the bill for the recall of British subjects from French service.
The Admiralty suggested that he, Wright with other ‘eminent merchant-builders’ be consulted about keeping a separate account for the building of the 30 new warships, on which Parliament insisted. The ledger shows payments of £940 to him between September 1677 and his death.
In A Seasonable Argument, he was described as ‘master of the King’s dock, his shipwright, and a violent man for taxes’, and his name appeared on both lists of the court party in 1678.
He was buried at Wapping on 11 Nov. 1678.
Nothing further is known of the Wood family, although his son continued to receive substantial payments from the naval treasurer during 1679.
bap. 2 June 1611, s. of George Woode, butcher, of Taynton, Glos. m. 25 Oct. 1638, Jane Smith of Poplar, Mdx., 1s. 2da.
Member, Shipwrights’ Co. by 1638; freeman, Dunwich 1658; commr. for assessment, Mdx. 1664-d., Suff. 1673-d., Dunwich 1677-d.; j.p. Mdx. by 1669-d.; commr. for recusants, Suff. 1675.
Although Wood was born in an inland village, he was a shipwright when he married in 1638, and Peter Pett later recommended him as a mast supplier to the Commonwealth navy.
During the Interregnum he partnered with John Wright as contractor and shipowner.
With the help of Adm. Batten he acquired a virtual monopoly in the early years of the Restoration, so he was could set his own price. Pepys succeeded in wresting at least one contract from him, to the benefit of Sir William Warren, but Wood continued to prosper, and was described as ‘very rich’ on the occasion of his son’s marriage in 1666.
William Wood Sr. stood for Dunwich at the 1671 by-election against Adm. Sir Thomas Allin. When he was called a stranger in Dunwich, his supporters said he had been a freeman since 1658 and ‘was intimately known to most of the freemen of Dunwich as having done eminent service in managing some of the affairs of the said corporation’.
Besides serving as the master of the corp. of shipwrights, he was also called a merchant of quality and dealing, and a great encourager of navigation, having freighted 30 sail of ships a year, each of at least 250 tons.
"At noon home to dinner, where I find Mrs. Wood, formerly Bab. Shelden, and our Mercer, who is dressed to-day in a paysan dress, that looks mighty pretty. We dined and sang and laughed mighty merry, and then I to the Office,"
Sounds cordial enough, but this is the last mention of Mrs. Barbery -- I wonder what happened to her and the rich William Wood, Jr.
Comments
Second Reading
About Saturday 25 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
Pepys lived for another 45 years ... are we sure he never had more bookcases made? He collected books his entire life. Jay's excellent suggestion might tell you how big his closett was when he died.
About Thursday 30 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
"framing my great letter to Mr. Hayes about the victualling of the fleete, about which there has been so much ado and exceptions taken by the Generalls."
I imagined a letter in a glass frame hanging on the wall, and thought that curious ... and then I realized Pepys meant that they were drafting and revising their response.
How curious that Pepys never mentioned receiving this letter ... he was so exciting about his new closet nothing else mattered. That gives us a clue about how many interesting details are missing. I've been waiting to hear the gist of the letter he was warned about, and guess this was it.
About Friday 24 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
Bigger than a breadbox. 25x14?
About Friday 24 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
I think Peach is right about Pepys being Simpson's opportunity to earn cash ... Evelyn tells us that the plague was gripping Deptford, and that was one of the two dockyards where Simpson worked. I bet the Deptford yards were closed. But Greenwich? I haven't heard about what was happening there. Locally there probably wasn't much shipbuilding happening right now.
HOWEVER -- Englishmen did not want the Dutch to invade. These craftsmen were part of a dedicated, trained, employed, industrial war machine. I bet most of them worked, paid or not. If the money went anywhere beyond Castlemaine, it went to the shipbuilders. Simpson could have packed up his tools and taken his family to plague-free Chatham, Sheerness, Harwich or Portsmouth and be welcomed by the brotherhood.
And I agree with John -- Pepys doesn't strike me as "officious". Professional, organized, demanding, yes. But not "assertive of authority in an annoyingly domineering way, especially with regard to petty or trivial matters".
Recently I criticized Pepys for spending his holiday writing a report on his victualing activities. And the next day he persisted with Coventry until he told him that he was doing a good job, and the victualing this year was better than Povy's efforts. Pepys was prepared for the attack from the Generals-at-Sea. Having his ducks in a row and his accounts current isn't being "officious." That's the job. His continued employment -- and potentially his head -- depended on it.
About Friday 24 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
I would have thought a Master-Joiner would have more pressing things to do than build bookcases at this moment. The timing for Pepys' improvements seems ill-considered on so many levels.
About Monday 27 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Is SP here a little paranoid and concerned about being overheard,"
Maybe ... or perhaps it was a lovely summer afternoon and they took advantage of it while they could. After all, the fleet is getting ready to go out again soon and the boatmen will disappear so they don't get pressed.
About Bath, Somerset
San Diego Sarah • Link
The baths at Bath could cure people suffering from lead poisoning. A story from 1666:
https://www.atlasobscura.com/arti…
Since Roman times lead often made its way into alcohol, either from its makers using lead acetate to sweeten wine, or storing it in containers glazed with lead.
Physicians were familiar with lead poisoning. Many sent the afflicted to Bath for the springs, where mineral water burbles out of the ground at 120°F. Visitors flocked to the area to bathe in elaborate pools of healing waters, seeking cures for everything from leprosy to infertility.
While hot springs are relaxing, for the most part that’s all they are. But taking a long dip did improve one ailment: the paralysis that occurs from chronic lead intoxication.
Even in the Middle Ages, physicians knew that sitting in the waters of Bath could occasionally cure some types of paralysis. The water’s reputation for curing the malady was advertised by the town in a display of discarded crutches.
One victim, a reverend from Lincolnshire, came to Bath in 1666 unable to lift his arms. After bathing in Bath’s waters every day for almost two months, his doctor noted that the reverend was able to doff his hat in greeting once more.
The explanation is simple. After consuming lead, the human body mistakes it for calcium and uses it to build bone. Over time, the accumulated poison causes violent symptoms. Weightlessness, as it happens, increases calcium loss from bones. Floating for hours gradually strips both calcium and lead from the skeleton, which is then urinated away.
Those “taking the waters” followed a system. Patients trooped into the pools in the morning, as early as 5 a.m. (The water was cleanest in the morning.) The King’s and Queen’s Baths were often filled with invalids, and the nearby Pump Room doled out glasses of warm, mineral-rich water. Other baths included the glamorous Cross Bath and the straightforwardly named Hot Bath and Leper’s Bath. Bathers submerged up to their necks, layered in thick clothing for modesty (for many years, the baths were mixed-gender).
To amuse bored bathers, musicians played instruments and sang.
By the early-18th century, it was de rigueur for the elite to go to Bath, not only to seek healing for high-end illnesses such as gout, but also to enjoy the pleasures of “dances, balls, gambling sessions, concerts, and theatrical performances in the evening,” writes academic Ian C. Bradley.
At the same time, doctors at the Bath General Hospital were conducting the “trial of the waters.” In what was one of the first long-term medical therapy trials in history, doctors at the hospital treated poor paralysis victims with a regimen of fresh food and daily soaks. And it worked -- sometimes.
About Sunday 26 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
"He told me how my Lord has drawn a bill of exchange from Spayne of 1200l., and would have me supply him with 500l. of it, but I avoyded it, being not willing to embarke myself in money there, where I see things going to ruine."
Well done Pepys. Did you tell Mr. Moore a whopper to get out of it? "I just spent all my available cash on fire ships" etc.?
About Polichinello
San Diego Sarah • Link
Samuel Pepys records seeing Pulcinella in London in 1666. Now known as Mr. Punch, he is an English version of Pulcinella, a character from the Italian Commedia dell’Arte, masked and elaborately costumed players who improvised a drama of stock characters in Naples and beyond in the 16th century. These performing troupes traveled throughout Italy and Europe and performed before Queen Elizabeth in 1572.
Pulcinella was never a major character in the Commedia dell’Arte – but somehow he appealed to puppeteers and the street crowds that they entertained.
In France he became Guignol; in Germany he was Kasper; in Spain he was Cocoliche – and in England, Mr. Punch.
Mr. Punch is still going strong with many of the same jokes and sight gags that entertained crowds in the streets of London 350 years ago.
He carries a club with which he beats anyone who offends him. He argues with his wife, Judy (in Pepys’ day she was called “Joan”). He throws the baby out the window when she cries. He gets in trouble with the law and tricks the devil into hanging himself.
Children love him because he’s irrepressible – “Look behind you, Look behind you,” they squeal when the crocodile rears up to devour him.
His squeaky voice comes from a whistle-like device called a “pivetta” or “swazzle” that the puppeteer holds in the roof of his mouth – another of the ancient practices still used in modern puppetry. An experienced artist can vary between a puppet squeak and a normal human voice in the course of a fast-paced dialogue (always at the risk of swallowing the swazzle).
There’s evidence that swazzles were used for puppets in Shakespeare’s day – although puppets weren’t called puppets back then. They were called “motions”.
So Mr. Punch tells us much about the history of puppetry; a sociopathic clown with the crabby wife (who would blame her for being crabby, being married to him?). He shows us how puppet theater steals and adapts; how it thrives in different cultures; how it sustains a theatrical tradition long after its main-stage source has died.
And Mr. Punch warns playwrights not to become too avant-garde, too esoteric, because puppet theater has always been, and remains, firmly rooted in the public squares and the streets – an art for ordinary people, and kids.
More from http://millstonenews.com/2017/03/…
About Wednesday 22 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
"This attack probably provoked that by the Dutch on Chatham."
This note probably comes from a time when access to the Dutch records was not freely available. We now know that the Dutch expected the French fleet to transport soldiers for a landing earlier this year. If they had been successful with a landing, they intended to go after Chatham.
Generals-at-Sea Monck and Rupert kept the Dutch in the Channel in 1666, but a good idea is not something you forget.
About Tuesday 20 March 1659/60
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Any flood records at all?"
highlight taken from https://www.british-history.ac.uk…
The riverside district north of Millwall was known as Limehouse Hole by the 17th century, and seems originally to have designated a part of the river itself. The name reflects the area's historically greater links with Limehouse than with Poplar or the Isle of Dogs.
The Breach, Poplar Gut and the Gut House.
A large section of the medieval river wall below Limehouse was breached on 20 March, 1660 and much of the Isle of Dogs flooded.
It was the worst breach since that of 1449, although smaller ones had occurred from time to time.
The Poplar Commissioners of Sewers repaired the damage and rebuilt other sections of defective wall, at a cost of more than £16,000, raised by the imposition on landowners of high rates (about £24 per acre). The work was done by William Ham, Orton Brooker and George Salmon, and presumably consisted of timber piling and planking, with chalk and clay fill and buttressing.
The new wall was back from the river behind unprotected foreland which was called simply "the Breach".
Most of the floodwater was drained, but approx.. 5 acres remained, stretching eastwards and came to be called the Great Gut, or Poplar Gut.
Pepys will become very familiar with this area in a few year's time.
About Wednesday 7 September 1664
San Diego Sarah • Link
highlights from https://www.british-history.ac.uk…
The Margetts's Ropeyard Site
The eight acres of riverside land immediately south of the boundary between Limehouse and Poplar, empty save perhaps for a few small houses behind the river wall, were leased by Sir Edward and Sir John Yate to John Graves in 1633. Graves was a shipbuilder at the yard on the north side of the boundary (later known as Limekiln Dockyard and then as Dundee Wharf).
The northern part of this property was sublet to George Margetts and, c1650, developed as a ropemaking yard with a wharf, rope house, storehouse, houses and a ropewalk.
In 1664 Samuel Pepys visited Margetts's ropeyard and decided to use it to supply the Navy.
The royal dockyards at Woolwich, Chatham and Portsmouth had their own roperies, but that at Deptford did not, and the Margettses were its principal suppliers of cordage in the late 17th century.
In 1662 Margetts acquired the freehold of Graves' 8 acres, with an additional 2½ acres to the east.
The estate subsequently passed by marriage to Cornelius Purnell, a Portsmouth shipwright. His son sold part of it in 1717 to Philip Willshire, who acquired the remainder in 1723.
About Limehouse
San Diego Sarah • Link
Let's try that link again
https://www.british-history.ac.uk…
Works perfectly!
About Limehouse
San Diego Sarah • Link
PART 2
The site south of the rope-yard buildings and north of the passage to Limehouse Hole Stairs (Thames Place) was a boat-builder's shed and yard, later used for mast-making.
Limehouse Hole was a plying place for watermen from the 17th century. There were two sets of river stairs in 1687, but only those at the end of the passage that became Thames Place survived.
Near the stairs there was a public house, perhaps known as the White Lion in the late 17th century, later the Chequers, and then the Horns and Chequers.
The Royal Oak public house stood to the east of the distillery on the road that became Emmett Street.
About Limehouse
San Diego Sarah • Link
Notes taken from https://www.british-history.ac.uk…
The riverside district north of Millwall was known as Limehouse Hole by the 17th century, and seems originally to have designated a part of the river itself. The name reflects the area's historically greater links with Limehouse than with Poplar or the Isle of Dogs.
The Breach, Poplar Gut and the Gut House.
A large section of the medieval river wall below Limehouse was breached on 20 March, 1660 and much of the Isle of Dogs flooded. It was the worst breach since that of 1449, although smaller ones had occurred from time to time.
The Poplar Commissioners of Sewers repaired the damage and rebuilt other sections of defective wall, at a cost of more than £16,000, raised by the imposition on landowners of high rates (about £24 per acre). The work was done by William Ham, Orton Brooker and George Salmon, and presumably consisted of timber piling and planking, with chalk and clay fill and buttressing.
The new wall was back from the river behind unprotected foreland which was called simply "the Breach".
Most of the floodwater was drained, but approx 5 acres remained, stretching eastwards and came to be called the Great Gut, or Poplar Gut.
Limehouse Hole went south from the parish boundary to the South West India Dock (Impounding) entrance lock and inland to include Garford Street.
This was one of the first parts of the parish of Poplar to be developed.
Limehouse spread east in the 17th century, Limehouse Hole was built up with shipping-related enterprises. There were shipbuilders, barge-builders, boat-builders, rope-makers, sail-makers, mast-makers, block-makers and ship-chandlers, as well as general wharfingers.
Away from the river there were other industrial premises, and some houses.
The Margetts's Ropeyard
The 8 acres of riverside land immediately south of the boundary between Limehouse and Poplar, empty save perhaps for a few small houses behind the river wall, were leased by Sir Edward and Sir John Yate to John Graves in 1633.
Graves was a shipbuilder at the yard on the north side of the boundary, later known as Limekiln Dockyard and then as Dundee Wharf.
The northern part of this property was sublet to George Margetts and, c1650, developed as a rope-making yard with a wharf, rope house, storehouse, houses and a rope walk.
In 1664 Samuel Pepys visited Margetts's ropeyard and decided to use it to supply the Navy. The royal dockyards at Woolwich, Chatham and Portsmouth had their own roperies, but Deptford did not, and the Margettses were its principal suppliers of cordage in the late 17th century.
In 1662 Margetts acquired the freehold of Graves' 8 acres, with an additional 2½ acres to the east.
Building gradually increased. In 1664 the Poplar Commissioners of Sewers built a storehouse south of Margetts's rope house, which housed the tools used by the 'marsh-men' to maintain the river wall and foreshore.
About William Wood (jun.)
San Diego Sarah • Link
William Wood, Snr., MP, was buried at Wapping on 11 Nov. 1678.
Nothing further is known of the Wood family, although his son, William Jr., continued to receive substantial payments from the naval treasurer during 1679.
Perhaps William Jr. didn't know as much about shipbuilding as his father after all -- or perhaps he died.
Ref Volumes: 1660-1690 -- Author: Paula Watson
http://www.marinelives.org/wiki/W…
About William Wood (sen.)
San Diego Sarah • Link
His election was disputed, but he was allowed to sit on 25 Jan., and was a moderately active MP in the Cavalier Parliament.
He was appointed to 28 committees, most on economic subjects like the preservation of naval stores, and those instructed in 1673 to look into the decay of the Muscovy, Eastland and Greenland trades, and to give local authorities powers to prevent fires.
On 19 Apr. 1675, during a debate on recalling British subjects from the service of the French, he suggested that Joseph, in time of plenty, provided for famine, and although they were in peace, [they] should think of building ships.
On 19 May 1675 Wood was appointed to the committee on the bill appropriating the customs for the use of the navy. His only speech, during a debate in committee on building war ships, gave technical info. on the size and cost of various rates.
As a Middlesex j.p. he was active against conventicles, and the danger from fire in the metropolitan areas.
In the 1677, he was appointed to the committee on the bill for the recall of British subjects from French service.
The Admiralty suggested that he, Wright with other ‘eminent merchant-builders’ be consulted about keeping a separate account for the building of the 30 new warships, on which Parliament insisted. The ledger shows payments of £940 to him between September 1677 and his death.
In A Seasonable Argument, he was described as ‘master of the King’s dock, his shipwright, and a violent man for taxes’, and his name appeared on both lists of the court party in 1678.
He was buried at Wapping on 11 Nov. 1678.
Nothing further is known of the Wood family, although his son continued to receive substantial payments from the naval treasurer during 1679.
Ref Volumes: 1660-1690 -- Author: Paula Watson
http://www.marinelives.org/wiki/W…
About William Wood (sen.)
San Diego Sarah • Link
William WOOD, 1611-1678, of Wapping Wall, Mdx.
bap. 2 June 1611, s. of George Woode, butcher, of Taynton, Glos.
m. 25 Oct. 1638, Jane Smith of Poplar, Mdx., 1s. 2da.
Member, Shipwrights’ Co. by 1638;
freeman, Dunwich 1658;
commr. for assessment, Mdx. 1664-d.,
Suff. 1673-d.,
Dunwich 1677-d.;
j.p. Mdx. by 1669-d.;
commr. for recusants, Suff. 1675.
Although Wood was born in an inland village, he was a shipwright when he married in 1638, and Peter Pett later recommended him as a mast supplier to the Commonwealth navy.
During the Interregnum he partnered with John Wright as contractor and shipowner.
With the help of Adm. Batten he acquired a virtual monopoly in the early years of the Restoration, so he was could set his own price. Pepys succeeded in wresting at least one contract from him, to the benefit of Sir William Warren, but Wood continued to prosper, and was described as ‘very rich’ on the occasion of his son’s marriage in 1666.
William Wood Sr. stood for Dunwich at the 1671 by-election against Adm. Sir Thomas Allin. When he was called a stranger in Dunwich, his supporters said he had been a freeman since 1658 and ‘was intimately known to most of the freemen of Dunwich as having done eminent service in managing some of the affairs of the said corporation’.
Besides serving as the master of the corp. of shipwrights, he was also called a merchant of quality and dealing, and a great encourager of navigation, having freighted 30 sail of ships a year, each of at least 250 tons.
About Tuesday 6 August 1667
San Diego Sarah • Link
"At noon home to dinner, where I find Mrs. Wood, formerly Bab. Shelden, and our Mercer, who is dressed to-day in a paysan dress, that looks mighty pretty. We dined and sang and laughed mighty merry, and then I to the Office,"
Sounds cordial enough, but this is the last mention of Mrs. Barbery -- I wonder what happened to her and the rich William Wood, Jr.
About Saturday 25 August 1666
San Diego Sarah • Link
Matt Newton, you asked the damnedest questions. How the heck would we know? The building burned down in the 1670's.